Maybe that's because, for Branson at least, the bevy of beautiful women he employs, and repeatedly uses for marketing stunts, are failed rocket scientists rather than aspiring models.

"Flying used to be glamorous and now, if you fly on United Airlines or American Airlines or many airlines in the world, the glamour has gone," he explains. "We've brought back the glamour.");document.write("

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"It is interesting to note that it is more difficult to get a job in Virgin Atlantic than it is to become a doctor in Australia - there are more applicants per job. Something like 200 people are interviewed for every one person we take on. We've got PhDs and who knows what.

"I'm proud to have them working for me not just because they're beautiful but because they've got through some of the most difficult interviews that anybody could ever get through.

"They've got to have enormous personality, they have intelligence interviews [and] psychological interviews."

If that sounds like Miss World, their boss sounds like a Perfect Match contestant.

"I enjoy life enormously," he says. "I live every minute to its full, I have a great time and, equally, I think most people want to have a great time.

"If the person at the top is having a good time then hopefully that ricochets all the way down and people know they can let their hair down."

If Virgin staff are not letting their hair down they seem to be taking their clothes off, or strutting around in bikinis. Sometimes the stunts are original Branson ideas, sometimes he wishes they were and sometime he just can't remember.

The key rule, he says, is that they don't offend. So, not like the priest stuff then?

"I don't know what priest stuff you mean," he says.

Don't you remember Melbourne, on the back of a scaled-down Popemobile?

"Oh? It was something to do with ... I can't even remember what it was now. It was something to do with Virgin, somewhere.

"I don't think there's anything I haven't dressed up as."

Gerry Harvey, one of the few Australia corporate executives who fronts his own outfit, says that Dick Smith would have been Branson's closest Australian model.

"But Dick Smith didn't do the girl stuff," says Mr Harvey, the executive chairman of Harvey Norman. "He was just the adventure stuff, but Richard likes to have the tits hanging all around him. Benny Hill would be Richard's idol."

Playing the face of Harvey Norman's advertising has taken a toll on Mr Harvey personally, in terms of lost anonymity. An added danger, at a corporate level, is bringing in the girls.

"It's fraught with danger," Mr Harvey says.

"There's a big body of people out there that want to bring you down when you do that sort of thing. You get people, when you do things like that, who really dislike you."